Danger of Deception

Colossians 2:6-23

Introduction:

1. Danger of Deception in New Life and Rules
   
   
2. Danger of Deception

• Philosophy = philosophia
  
  
• love of wisdom 1a) used either of zeal for or skill in any art or science, any branch of knowledge.

Translations use words They are described as vain, empty, hollow, high-sounding, nonsense (NLT)

• Used once in the NT of the theology, or rather theosophy, of certain Jewish Christian ascetics, which busied itself with refined and speculative enquiries into the nature and classes of angels, into the ritual of the Mosaic law and the regulations of Jewish tradition respecting practical life.

Theosophy = any of a number of philosophies maintaining that a knowledge of God may be achieved through:

• spiritual ecstasy,
• direct intuition,
• or special individual relations, especially the movement founded in 1875 as the Theosophical Society by Helena Blavatsky and Henry Steel Olcott (1832–1907).

One of the challenges being taught by legalists (Jews) was that of the role of Circumcision.

1A. Role of Circumcision

• Circumcision is the surgical removal of the prepuce, or foreskin, of a male. The word circumcise literally means “to cut around.”
• As a religious rite, circumcision was required of all of Abraham’s descendants as a sign of the covenant God made with him (Genesis 17:9–14; Acts 7:8). T
• he Mosaic Law repeated the requirement (Leviticus 12:2–3), and Jews throughout the centuries have continued to practice circumcision (Joshua 5:2–3; Luke 1:59; Acts 16:3; Philippians 3:5).
  
  
• Concerning the first issue, New Testament Christians are no longer under the Old Testament Law, and circumcision is no longer required. This is brought out in a number of New Testament passages, among which are Acts 15; Galatians 2:1–3; 5:1–11; 6:11–16; 1 Corinthians 7:17–20; Colossians 2:8–12; and Philippians 3:1–3.

Part of the problem was the insistence that the tradition of circumcision was part of a continued law Christians should be observing.

ACTS 15 – The Issue is addressed

Conclusion was: (1) you are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, (2) from blood from the meat of strangled animals and from (3) sexual immorality.

Application: So, be careful and avoid ‘empty philosophies and from the basic principles of this world’ (even if they seem to be based on spiritual practice).

1B. Celebrating certain ‘Days’

1. Eat and Drink
   1. Holy days
   1. New moons
   1. Sabbath

1C. Don’t let anyone condemn you:

1. By pious self-righteousness
2. Worship of Angeles

Those who are practicing Theosophy say:

• they have had visions about these things.
• Their sinful (carnal) minds have made them proud.
• They are not connected to Christ!

Conclusion: Colossians 2:20, (If, Wherefore, therefore, since)

‘if you died with Christ from the basic principles of the world, why, as though living in the world, do you subject yourselves to regulations’—(NKV)

‘You have died with Christ, and he has set you free from the spiritual powers of this world. So why do you keep on following the rules of the world, such as…’ (NLT)